The thing about trials is that there's a reasonable chance the patient ends up in the control/placebo group, which is something to think about when signing up for miracle. It could help explain some of the "done nothing" studies in your friend's journey.

A good friend of mine signed up for a trial as an alternative treatment for her aggressive breast cancer, everyone's hopes went up (trials tend to have that effect on people) but "nothing happened". She passed away 6 months after the trial started without knowing if a placebo was used. It's painful anecdata, but the few people I know that got into cancer studies as an alternative to their regular treatment, none ever had the study knowingly influence their outcome. Yet, in every case, the study was the one-hundred-percent animic lifeboat to grab on to.

Participating in a trial is about helping science just as, or more than, it is about helping yourself.